


Hiding, Not Quite Hidden

by Brosca-Pride (Fan_by_Proxy)



Category: Dragon Age II
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-05-17
Updated: 2015-05-17
Packaged: 2018-03-30 22:48:07
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,173
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3954763
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Fan_by_Proxy/pseuds/Brosca-Pride
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Hawke and Fenris, together forever, even if it means hiding themselves and children from everything.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Hiding, Not Quite Hidden

     The sound of a chair crashing to the floor is nothing close to the sound of a Chantry coming apart at the seams and leveling a district; but the unexpected suddenness of it still sparked a deep panic.  Only the deeply-rooted need to live unnoticed by the neighbors kept Hawke from blasting a new doorway in their little home.  Instead she came barreling into the kitchen to find the table upended, chairs broken on the floor, and her family staring at each other in terror.  
     "Hawke--  
     "Mommy!"  
     She knelt, arms wide, to scoop up their daughter.  There were splinters in her coarse black hair.  Hawke began to pick them out carefully.  "You two make it very hard for a lady to keep a clean home." She was rather proud that her voice came out so calm and even.  
     "I just wanted to show Daddy my sparkies.  See?"  Slim little fingers twisted around each other and broke apart, drawing arcs of blue light in the safety of her mother's arms.  "See what I can do Mommy?"  
     "Oh my, that's quite good.  But remember, we can't go around surprising people with our sparkies.  Makes them nervous." Hawke couldn't bring herself to chide much rougher than that; after all, her father hadn't started with 'Most Templars will happily cut you in half' until she was 8, and little Bethany was barely six.    
     "I'm sorry."  
     Hawke pressed a kiss to her forehead.  "Fetch the broom for Mommy, the long way please." She said as she let go of her daughter.  "And no more sparkies or messes the rest of the afternoon."  
     Bethany took off in a run, fear already forgotten.  She would most likely be distracted by the chickens outside, forget the broom three more times after that; all was well.  
     Hawke rose, crossing the debris with arms outstretched.    
     "Hawke, I'm sorry--I wasn't--  
     The lyrium glow still hadn't faded from his hands.  "Hush.  It's alright, it's only a table.  Not like we haven't had supper on the floor before." she cooed.  
     Fenris kept his face sharply turned, brow furrowed so deeply it threatened to never smooth again.  "I could have--  
     "You didn't."  she said firmly.  "Haven't I told you?  Can't always focus on what _could_ have gone wrong; distracts too much from what _actually_ goes wrong, remember?"  she smiled faintly.  
     He shook his head.  "Marian..." His voice broke, just a little; the expression on his face as troubled, as deeply shamed and hurt as only fear could make it.  
     She took his hand and pressed it to her chest, right over her heart.  The fingertips fell into their spread; the action he'd done so often, voluntary or not.  Once he'd very nearly done it to her, very nearly _literally_ taken her heart out.  A nightmare; one of the many he never explained, and she'd gone to comfort him.  When his fingers had sunk in, the smell of smoking lyrium and burnt blood had nearly robbed her of her right to scream.  Luck, the Creators, the Maker, Andraste, and a couple of Paragons had been on her side that night.  Since then, when he was unsure, when he was afraid, she could take his hand and make him feel her trust; when words didn't cut it, when the nights were too long and too dark and too full of demons, she could put his hand over her heart, over the scars, and make him believe her.  "Hush Fenris.  It's only a table." she murmured.  
They stood there quietly, her holding his hand to her heart.  She let go of his wrist when she felt his fingertips press in, just a little. 

     "I'm sorry Hawke."  
     "No one's hurt, and if I know our little girl, she's outside singing to the chickens.  All's well Fenris.  It is." she insisted.  
     "You're disgustingly optimistic." His hand went from her heart to her cheek, thumb dragging across her cheekbone as he leaned into her, forehead to forehead.    
     Such a silly chide; something she would hear in her sleep sometimes.  Their love was, as Varric pointed out, 'something peculiar and probably terminal'.  "I suppose now would be a bad time to tell you we're having another baby."  
     There was a long pause.  "What?"  
     Hawke nodded.  "Another baby, yes.  Not surprising, my mother did manage the four of us in her short life."  
     Fenris' hands, still shaking, came to rest lightly on her stomach.    
     "I rather thought, if it were a boy this time...we might name him Leto."    
     His head snapped up sharply, feral anger flashing across his eyes.  "That name--  
     "Is a good name; a name that's with us, even if we never use it." She'd thought about it for a while; about whether or not it was even a good idea to bring it up.  So little good had come of his early life; but even if he didn't remember the boy he'd been, that was still a part of him, deep inside, and she wanted to acknowledge it.  To have more tying them and their children together than his elvhen blood and her magic.  
     "It's a cursed name."  
     "It's a good thing I've got that wonderful knack for breaking curses."  
     He laughed at that; a short deep bark that never sounded as lighthearted as it genuinely was.  "Why not Carver?"  
     "I'd like to like my own child." Hawke replied drily.  She closed her eyes and felt his hands cup her face again, thumbs now pressing the corners of her mouth.  She must be making that tight-lipped, not-quite smile.  That smile worried him, Fenris had told her once; it usually meant that her heart was breaking, and her broken heart generally meant someone was getting set on fire.    
     "There's time to think of better, less cursed names." He murmured, pressing a kiss to lips that were only just starting to relax.  
     "I brought the broom Mommy!"  
     It was a little celebration of victory, that Fenris did not jerk away at the interruption.  He was still slow to display affections publicly, and there were days that the privacy of their little house weren't private enough.  His pull-away was much slower, more natural, and not nearly as far.  "There's my girl.  Were you singing to the chickens again?" he asked as he knelt down, arms open.  
     "Only a little." Bethany said, dropping the broom to run into them.  
     Hawke smiled, going to pick it up and start to sweep as Fenris hoisted their child to his hip.  "Well then let us go and finish your concert, or they may well lay square eggs tomorrow."  
She giggled as he carried her away, all worries of lyrium and magic sparks forgotten in the warmth of the afternoon sun and the not-always-appreciative clucking of the chickens.  When the door was shut after them, Hawke settled on the remaining stool to have a little cry.  She would blame it on the baby sitting warmly in her body, and not the fear that things were going just well enough to take a turn for the horribly, horribly wrong.

 

 


End file.
